Our Blog

¹ Peter 2.5-9

like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For it stands in scripture: “See, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.” To you then who believe, he is precious; but for those who do not believe, “The stone that the builders rejected has become the very head of the corner,” and “A stone that makes them stumble, and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do. But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

When reading this scripture, the words that spoke to me were "living stone" & "house." I love knowing that we are each alive but rooted in the Lord and that he is our foundation. Implicit in being alive is that you are ever changing and evolving, and in this scripture we see an image of a house being built with these individual stones. Each coming together for a greater good. In the past 9 months I have thought a lot about a house. In this time when we are confined to our, sometimes tiny, apartments we call home in order to keep ourselves and our neighbors safe from a virus, it can feel isolating. In isolation I am comforted by the image of us working together for something much greater- building a house and a world that is covid free. I want to also be grateful for my little home, though it may only be 500 square feet- it has provided me safety in this uncertain time. I know there are many in our city and our country facing houselessness. While we have retreated to our safe havens, and many have complained, we must not forget what a privilege this is.

While we have been isolated, I have thought a lot about what the house God is building will look like. Covid is not the only challenge we face as a nation. We have seen first hand that white supremacy, racism, bigotry, & sexism are flourishing in our country. It is important to remember that, in our isolation, grief, anger, sadness, and frustration, we can and must work together to create the house God calls us to be a part of. A house full of light pushing out the darkness. While I have often felt great darkness around us this year, I am grateful that my eyes have been opened to the realities of my fellow Americans. In this time of advent I am expectant and continue to pray for our country and communities. I pray God will reveal to us his vision for the house he is building so that we may shine a light in the darkness. I see glimpses of this in our community at Holy Apostles, and am grateful to be a part of the work happening here. Through Sacred Ground groups over the summer, supporting undocumented families with rent support, and providing school supplies to children at PS 15, I feel connected to God's heart, and pray we continue to seek out these opportunities to serve as a community, and individually.

Ephesians 5.6-14

"Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes on those who are disobedient. Therefore do not be associated with them. For once you were darkness, but now in the Lord you are light. Live as children of light— for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true. Try to find out what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to mention what such people do secretly; but everything exposed by the light becomes visible, for everything that becomes visible is light. Therefore it says, “Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

As a child and then adolescent, I had a real problem with God's wrath and the notion of obedience. As one of seven children, life often seemed to me to be a litany of "dos" and "don'ts" - from relentless daily chores to taking care of the littles or being one of the elder children who "should know better." Consequences for not fulfilling one's family duties did not always seem fair, and being perfectly obedient (aka "responsible") seemed an unreasonable expectation.

My mom always told us that hell was not a place but "separation from God." And I thought well, if God is just going to get mad at me for not following his arbitrary rules, then I am not so sure I like him all that much.

Ah, grasshopper! As I aged, and fell away from faith and church, and then returned, I realized that I had misunderstood obedience all along. My mother was right - pain, hell, suffering IS separation from God. Because there is darkness and there is light and turning to the light is to turn to God - and vice versa. The "obedience" that I found so infuriating was, as we know, a gift and an opening - an invitation to spiritual and real-world discipline. Not punishment, but an invitation. Not blind power but a challenge: to seek the light of God and Christ even when darkness is upon us or, perhaps, even when we have found our way into darkness all by ourselves.

I have said to anyone who will listen that Advent is my favorite season. I think I love it because I am deeply moved by the notion of light in the darkness - not only the ability of even the tiniest light to overcome darkness, but the very beauty that such light casts: the campfire, the candle, the single streetlight, the moon, the lit window on a dark street, the "fairy lights" on Christmas trees - these beckon and comfort us precisely because they are surrounded by darkness.

And so, too, do our lives sway in this dance between turning towards God and turning away; from being secure in God's love and wondering if God is there at all; from being grounded in faith and having our faith tested and tried. This passage from Ephesians reminds us to "Live as children of light— for the fruit of the light is found in all that is good and right and true."

Advent is a time of waiting and also a time of awakening - awakening to God's promise of love and light and redemption that is always right in front of us and around us, even and especially in the darkness.

"Sleeper, awake! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

John 12.35-36

Jesus said to them, “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness may not overtake you. If you walk in the darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light.” After Jesus had said this, he departed and hid from them.

I knew the church building of my childhood like the back of my hand. My father was a pastor and so both my parents spent full Sunday mornings at post-church coffee hours and elders’ meetings and potlucks. I attended for as long as I could but spent most of my time exploring the building. The church was filled with backstage wooden staircases, hidden closets, and doorways, invisible to the untrained eye. I loved to roam around in that church. One of my favorite places was a triangular closet, wedged beneath a stairway—a storage place for holiday decorations. It was completely dark. And quiet. I loved to crawl in there after service and listen to the gentle footsteps coming down for coffee hour and the muffled voices hovering above my head. I sat in that womb-like space and felt tucked into the church, wrapped in sweet darkness and the voices of my church family.

The darkness was not scary, it was safe and sweet. I needed it. I was sometimes overwhelmed by all the people, all the ideas, all the chatting. I needed that quiet darkness to help me come home to myself.

Jesus said “The light is with you for a little longer. Walk while you have the light, so that the darkness does not overtake you. If you walk in darkness, you do not know where you are going. While you have the light, believe in the light, so that you may become children of light”

Jesus does not speak about Darkness as a moral negative or with judgement. I think Western thinking can lead us (or maybe just me!) too quickly into binary thinking: darkness = scary, or bad, or far from God. But if we carry this bias into the text, I think we miss what Jesus may be saying. Jesus is speaking practically. In darkness you can’t see clearly-- you need something to guide you, something to orient you. As Jesus prepares his friends for his departure, he is acknowledging a reality, a human experience—there will be uncertainly, there will be unknowns, there will be change, there will be darkness. So he tells his friends to cherish the light, to memorize the light, to hold the light near so that when the unknowns find them, they will have comfort, a guide, and courage. I think Jesus’ call to his friends is a call to us all: become children of light—become students of seeing in the dark, become people who can remember what matters most in times of not knowing or of uncertainty, become friends with darkness, or at least acquaintances.

There are times we are meant to live in clarity, and times we are meant to live in ambiguity; but the paradox is lovely—sometimes it is in the ambiguity, in the seasons of not knowing, in the darkness--when one’s truth shines through with brilliant clarity. Just as we need to cherish the “light,” when the light is with us, maybe too we can cherish the darkness, when darkness is with us. Maybe there are moments we need to crawl into the dark, unknown, triangular closets of life and listen for the voices of love, coming from on high and coming from deep within.